Top Chef recap: Big Gay Wedding

After Grayson left us after pretty much telling Tom Colicchio to talk to the hand last week, we lost this season’s resident enfant terrible. Luckily, we still have Angelina and Giselle to cause some drama and be the cooking partners everyone else avoids like lepers. Speaking of partners, the Quickfire Challenge was all about dates — both the bite-sized, wrinkly fruit and the romantic ritual.

The chefs drove into a date farm — and by that I don’t mean the Bachelor mansion — and had to create a dish that showcased dates and reminded them of their best, most romantic dates. Carl decided to make a date milkshake because it reminded him of the time he couldn’t go to the ballet with his girlfriend after getting his wisdom teeth pulled. (That sentence is so nerdy, I don’t know where to begin.) Marjorie basically admitted that she’s never been on a date, and Isaac was really more interested in a date machete. A gross moment: Wesley talked about how much he and his wife love cheese plates, even though he’s lactose intolerant.

Kwame was awfully interested in our Quickfire guest judge, supermodel and host Chrissy Teigen. I love how Padma was so obviously dressed with the knowledge that she’d be standing next to Chrissy Teigen.

Jason, after floundering socially among the other chefs last week, made his mark by winning Quickfire and immunity for his charred, spicy carrots.

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Continuing on with the theme of love, Art Smith, chef to Oprah and Obama, was on hand to announce that for the Elimination Challenge the chefs would be catering a big fat gay wedding of 25 couples at once — which Padma would be officiating while wearing a shiny white suit from the future. The ceremony really was heartwarming, and Art and his husband took the opportunity to renew their vows. Tears all around.

The chefs split off into pairs, and once again, no one wants to work with Giselle — Karen gets stuck with her. Jason and Angelina also ran into some friction because Angelina wanted to put through a good-enough dish quickly while Jason wanted to take more time to get things perfect. Jason sounded like a bit like a know-it-all when he was telling Angelina not to call their Swiss chard rolls a “dolma,” but Angelina has a habit of under-thinking her dishes, so Jason was right to split those hairs.

The winning team was Wesley and Kwame for their shrimp dish, but Kwame pulled the individual win for the sauce, even prompting Art to say he wished he could hire Kwame. Kwame appears to be the front-runner to win the whole competition, but he ended up in one of the bottom teams, as well, but only because his sauces were in demand and he provided the flavoring for Phillip’s “gummy” potato-paste dish. Phillip claimed the potato paste came out exactly as he wanted it to, which prompted Jason and Marjorie to call him out in front of the judges since he had initially called the potato paste “mashed potatoes.” I have to admit I didn’t quite understand the point of the argument. Whether Phillip made crappy potato glue on purpose or on accident doesn’t seem to matter much. It’s still crappy.

What I did understand, though, was that Giselle was playing the game instead of trying to be the best chef in the competition. She didn’t offer much help to Karen in the challenge, then tried to disown their asparagus dish once it failed in front of the judges, and then called herself honorable for doing so. Gail was right to argue for Giselle’s elimination. Once Angelina goes — seriously, how many lives does she get? — then we’ll really have a competition.